Just about any movie that involves the mob will get a look for me, which will often suck me into such bombs as this one. The problem isn’t that it’s about the mob, it’s that it moves so darn slow. Sure, there’s plenty of blood along the way, but ultimately, nothing happens until the final ten minutes or so. That last ten minutes isn’t bad – it’s the eighty minutes leading up to it that is so painful to get through that makes it simply unbearable to get to that it’s just not worth the investment.

Claire (Kyra Sedgwick) is loyal to a fault. Beyond a fault, probably. She’s loyal to The Boss (Robbie Coltrane). She’s loyal to her partner Nick (ultra-cool Stanley Tucci, probably the only reason to watch the movie). She’s even loyal to mob moll Kitty (Robin Tunney), after a fashion.

The problem is that she ultimately can’t make a decision on who to be loyal to, and since Nick is dying and he usually tells her what to do, she’s in a bit of a pickle.

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Long before The Santa Clause 2 (eight years, in fact), there was The Santa Clause. This movie introduced us to Scott Calvin (Tim Allen), who is basically a regular guy trying to come to grips with the fact that his ex-wife and her new husband have custody of his son, and he doesn’t get to see him very often.

Add to that the fact that his job is rather demanding, and even when he does get to see his son, such as on Christmas Eve, he’s usually running late, and his son doesn’t always want to see him, so things just aren’t going very well. All that is about to change.

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Washburn (Jimmy Fallon) has had some issues with driving, which is a problem, being a police officer, and it’s really a problem now because he’s got a lead on a robbery, but he needs a vehicle to follow them, since they are really good drivers.

That leaves him in a pinch, because he’s lost his driving privilege due to his problems, so he does what anyone in his situation will do – he takes a cab. He picks a good one. The driver, Belle (Queen Latifah) has issues of her own, but hers of an entirely different sort. She drives too fast, but she’s actually good at it.

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Frankie Dunn (Clint Eastwood, who also directed) is, by most accounts, trying to hide in his gym. He’s content to finish out his years with his friend, Eddie Dupris (Morgan Freeman) by his side. Unfortunately, like doesn’t always work out the way that we have it planned.

One day, Maggie Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank) comes in and tells Frankie that she’d like to box. There are two reasons that this is bad. One is that Maggie has little, if any, boxing talent. Two is that she just won’t go away, and that bothers Frankie more than anything. He just wants to be left alone. But like most things, if you stick with it long enough, you may just get your wish, and Maggie does. Eventually, Frankie gives in and agrees to be her trainer – but only as long as she gives it everything she has.

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The mutants return in this follow-up to 2000’s X-Men. As before, if you are expecting the same team of mutants as you read about in the comics growing up, you probably are going to be disappointed. Chances are you will see glimpses of them, but they simply aren’t the same. If you are just a fan of movies in general, then you’ll probably get along fine.

Now that things have calmed down and it seems that the Mutant Registration Act is back out of everyone’s mind, it looks like things will return to normal for a while. But if that were the case, there wouldn’t be any need for a movie. It seems that William Stryker (Brian Cox), will do something about the mutant “problem” if there’s anything that he can do about it.

It turns out that his son, Jason attended the school run by Professor X many years ago, but Stryker and his wife were hoping that he would be cured of his problems, and that’s just not how the school works. It also seems that Stryker was somehow involved in the creation of the mutant we know as Wolverine, but we’re not going to learn the details of that one, at least not right now.

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There aren’t too many movies that I like that start at the end. This one isn’t likely to make me a convert. It starts with a man (Bill Pullman) jumping to his death from a hotel balcony. At least, I think it was a hotel. It may have been an apartment. I really couldn’t tell.

And that was the second part of the problem. I was completely and utterly lost all the way through this movie. I followed the plot well enough, but I spent much of the time trying to figure out what was happening around the plot. That’s no fun.

What I can tell you is that Karen (Sarah Michelle Gellar) is some sort of exchange student. At least, she is an American. Suddenly, due to the death of a nurse or housekeeper or something, an opening becomes available for her, and so she jumps at the chance. But the house where she will be working is possessed by the spirit or someone who was killed. Apparently an ancient proverb says that someone killed with great emotion will remain there, and that’s what happened.

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Danny (Jet Li) is a dog. Not a real dog, but he might as well be a dog. He has an “owner” named Bart (Bob Hoskins), and he stays in a cage, eating with his hands, barely speaking and simply doing what he is told when he is told to do it. He even has a collar.

You see, Bart isn’t a nice man. He is a loan shark. And Danny is his muscle. When someone doesn’t pay back the money that they owe Bart, Bart takes off Danny’s collar and tells Danny to get them, and that’s just what Danny does. He gets them and he gets them good, typically beating them within an inch of their lives. This is his life, because it is all that he knows. He has a few memories of music, and he has a picture of someone he thinks is his mother, but that’s about it.

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This isn’t exactly your father’s X-Men (though they do make a few pokes at the comic here and there, like a reference to their uniforms being made of spandex). If you recall the original lineup, you might think Angel, Beast, Cyclops, Iceman, and Marvel Girl. If you watch this movie expecting to see them, you’ll likely be disappointed.

This is because Angel and Beast are nowhere to be found. Cyclops is here, but has a fairly muted role. Iceman is here as well, but rather than a full-fledged member of the team, he’s a teenager working through his powers. Marvel Girl isn’t mentioned by name, but is instead simply called Jean Grey, her real name. Professor X is certainly around as well. But it’s not the same as the comic, so get that thought out of your head.

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With a similar premise as that of Meet the Santas, it seems that Santa is in need of a bride. Since this one came out three years before that one, I’ll have to say that they had the idea first. But who really knows?

In any case, it seems that Scott Calvin (Tim Allen) has settled into his role of Santa very well. But recently he’s been losing a little weight and it seems that the magic that made him into Santa so convincingly the first time around is leaving him. What is odd is that it took so long to happen. Perhaps there is a statute of limitations on how long Santa can operate without a wife, or maybe it’s only once someone realizes that he is supposed to have a wife. I don’t know. But it’s happening.

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The average person watches 7 hours of television per day. Roy Knable (the late John Ritter) must watch enough for two other people who don’t watch at all, at least according to his son, who narrates this for us to open the movie.

Roy’s wife Helen (Pam Dawber) would probably agree. She feels like she doesn’t even see Roy any more. So one night while she’s trying to talk to him, she throws something into the TV. This doesn’t even deter Roy – he just puts another one (albeit a smaller one) on top. Then the real trouble starts.

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